Festival was a fun end to summer

What a difference a day makes.
Saturday it was cold, rainy and windy. Sunday it was warm and sunny. I like to think the brief cold spell is Mother Nature’s reminder that we need to quit dilly-dallying and prepare for winter.
It is also the time for our community’s fall festival. The Heritage Fest is our official goodbye to summer. It is typically held on the nastiest weekend in October. In previous years there has been wind, cold, rain bordering on snow, and several combinations of the above. This does not stop people from coming out for one last get-together before the weather compels us to stay indoors.
I was scheduled to sit with the Master Gardeners on Saturday. As the festivities had always been outdoors, I dressed in extra layers and dug out my winter coat. I was pleasantly surprised to find that our designated space was inside the Jay County Historical Museum. We had been assigned to share a room with an iron lung, an old dentist chair and other ancient medical equipment. A mannequin modeling a nurse’s uniform stood guard at the door. She had a pronounced rash of mysterious origin.
I was stunned by how many people braved the dreary weather to check out the exhibits and displays. The place was packed. Several people stopped by with gardening questions. Others stopped by just to talk.
At one point I got up and walked around. I passed the band playing a medley of tunes. I ducked into a room containing a bunch of quilters. To the quilter who asked if she could apply weed killer to her flower bed containing bulbs, I would like to amend my answer. Yes, she can apply herbicide but it would be better to target the weeds by brushing the product onto the unwanted plants. There is less chance of inadvertently murdering her bulbs that way than by spraying them.
I stopped by one display created by an ultimate recycler. The retired Navy veteran had taken wheels from old chairs, welded them to a spark plug, a couple of bent nails and some odds and ends to create a collection of toy motorcycles. Spoons and forks magically became frogs or flowers. All sorts of things normally found at garage sales gained new life with the application of his welding talent and more creativity than I will ever have. Sadly, he does not give lessons.
Across from the Master Gardener booth a couple was giving a reverse mastectomy to a cutout of a cow. A plastic container with, shall we say, “spigots,” was being set in place so that people could pretend to milk a cow.
I haven’t milked a cow by hand since I was a little girl. I still remember the procedure. The easy part was calling the cows. They trudged to their assigned places. Then the fun began. Most of the time things went well but sometimes a cow would wait until the bucket was almost full before kicking it over. I doubt if the fake cow was rigged to kick.
After my shift was done, I stopped at a food booth for some bean soup and corn bread to take home for my husband’s supper. I can’t stand bean soup so I thought it would be a treat for him. Plus, it got me out of having to fix supper.
Sunday was warm and sunny. I went back to the festival, only this time I sat with the woodcarvers. I brought along a puzzle I was making. It is a castle containing dragons. I encouraged several groups of children to touch my carvings and let them take the puzzle apart and then try to get all the dragons back into the box. It wasn’t as easy as they thought it would be. Only one of them gave up completely.
I munched on cracklins made by a very nice guy who also did some amazing woodburnings. I bought some apples and a cantaloupe from a man who undercharged me. I brushed away a whole passel of bees who may have been attracted to a display of handmade soap. I watched children try to walk on stilts while others had sword fights with weapons made from balloons. There were plenty of other wholesome activities for one and all.
What started out as a dreary weekend ended up being a delightful way to end the summer.